Natalie’s P. O. V.
I sat in the office, feeling tons of paper was due on me, the morning sun lighting the restaurant right through the windows. But I just sat there working those numbers, though my mind kept going back to the fight the prior night that Brandon and I had had. It was tension like it had never been between us, and I was feeling more of the sting from his words, hurt boiling underneath the anger.
Wouldn’t allow the luxury of it. Not now. Work had always been my solace, my refuge from the tempest that rattled at the gates of my personal life. Today would be no different.
I exhaled and pushed thoughts of Brandon to the back of my mind, burying myself once again in the reports in front of me. My restaurant was doing well-I needed to do well. I had to be top, right from the word go and to make sure everything was perfect, more so now that we were entering into peak season.
There was a very light, soft knock that soon ushered in heavier raps before I was seized from my inventory orders’ contemplation by a customer. I looked up only to see Hailey, my best friend and fellow worker, at my door with one of her perfectly curious faces.
“Hey, Nat,” she said, going to the doorway, “someone’s here to see you.”
I scowled, setting my pen to one side. “Who is it?”
Hailey shrugged something wicked dancing in her eyes. “She didn’t mention her name, but she’s waiting in the restaurant. Seemed quite insistent about talking with you.”
Now a bit intrigued, I rose to my feet, jerked my skirt down, and gathered my purse. “Alright, I’ll go see who it is. Thanks, Hails.”
Hailey gave me a quick salute before pivoting around and following me back out as I left the office, my mind already racing with the names of potential people. Maybe some customer with a grievance? Or some other with a business plan to discuss?
But the minute that I stepped into the eatery and my eyes fell on the woman standing by the door, everything came crashing to a slowdown.
It was she, the same woman I saw Brandon locking lips with.
I gasped, my very breath caught inside my throat suddenly, smacked with incredulity and anger. What was she doing here? Why now of all times?
She turned with my approach, curling that sly, wicked grin onto her lips. She is a grossly beautiful woman, with much flowing hair and the kind of figure that could so easily have seemed to make the cover of any magazine. Still, something cold in those eyes, something calculating, set my teeth on edge.
“Natalie, I presume?” she replied, smooth as silk.
I kept my face blank, though every single instinct I possessed told me to turn and run in the other direction. “Yes, that’s right. And you are?”
She offered me a perfectly manicured hand. “Arlys. Arlys Waters.”
I shook her hand, my grip firm. “What can I do for you, Arlys?
It was a light, tinkling laugh, small and insubstantial as a draft of summer air, but there was nothing small about the way she looked at me. “Oh, I just wanted to meet the woman who managed to tie Brandon Martinez down. Quite the feat, I must say.”
Something in her words, though jealousy, or maybe amusement? And again, that just added to my unease because I couldn’t determine what.
I cross my arms over my chest, trying to will my voice to come out strong. “If you’ve got something to say, Arlys, then say it-you know I’m not in the mood for games.”
The smile just seemed to grow, as if she was highly gratified by my attempt at bravado. “Straight to the point. I like that. Alright, then. I’m here for the reason that I thought it was about time we exchanged a few words. Woman to woman.”
I raised an eyebrow at her, not rising to the bait. “On what matter, exactly?”
“You mean Brandon, don’t you?” she volleyed back, dripping in saccharine, full of condescension. “I’m not sure if Brandon told you our history together, but he and I were quite the couple once upon a time.”
Anger ticked through my veins as I clenched my teeth. “That was in the past, Arlys. People move on.”.
“So do they?” She tipped her head the way a little girl might as if considering the notion. “Funny thing about Brandon, he’s never let go of the past. Not with me, anyway.”
A strong pang hit home. But I was damned if I’d give her the satisfaction of knowing she was getting to me. “What in hell do you mean by that?”
She stepped closer still, her eyes flashing with something positively animalistic. “At least know what kind of man is sharing your bed these days, Nat. Brandon might be married to you now, but you aren’t definitely the first woman he has intertwined his fingers with. And you sure as hell won’t be the last.”
Her words seemed to bristle on my skin and tangle in my hair. I curled my hands into fists at my sides. “I don’t know what you’re trying to get from this conversation, but it’s not gonna work.”
She laughed again, and her voice grated out in raucous discord on my raw nerves. “Oh, I’m not trying for anything. I only thought you ought to know the truth about it.”.
“What truth are you talking about?” The words came out harsher than I had outlined in my mind, but by then, I couldn’t give a damn. At that time, I was tired of her shying away; whatever she had come to say, I wanted her to say it and get it over with.
She gave me this pitiful, poor look-like I was sort of an idiot who doesn’t know the way things really are in this world. “The truth about Brandon and me. About how connected we were to one another. He was my everything; I was his everything.”
I swallowed hard. My heart was throbbing in my chest. “That was in the past. He’s with me now.
“For now,” she concurred, her smile icicle-cold. “But come on, do you really think there’s anything you can do against him? Do you really think that he’s marrying you for love?”
She was flaying my inside with every word, yet I refused to give her the pleasure. “Our marriage is none of your business.”
“Oh, yes it is,” she assured me, her voice a little softer. Softening in a way that sent shivers up the back of my neck. “You know, Natalie, Brandon married you because I left him. Now that I’m back, he’s going to be mine again.”
That line sort of felt like it arrested the air between us, hanging with a lethal color in the air. I just gaped at her, what she was sayingquite literally, my mind couldn’t process.
Her step closed into mine, her eyes locked onto mine. “You may wear his ring on your finger, but I’ll always have his heart. And I’m not walking out of here empty-handed.”
The words struck like a shot to the solar plexus, and there was nothing to answer. Blood surged into my ears-a helter-skelter muddle of anger, fear, and confusion whirling in my head like a hurricane.
I tried to open my mouth and reply, but no words came out. Paralyzed, ensnared by her web of manipulation.
And the ghastly thing was, as far as I knew, she could be lying.
She finally smiled at me, lined with triumph this time, and turned to saunter out of the restaurant, leaving me helpless in the middle of my own place of work, more powerless than I’d ever felt in my whole life.